Like a clumsy bumblebee
he alights on a flower
bending the fragile stem
he elbows his way
through rows of petals
like the pages of a dictionary
he wants in
where the fragrance and the sweetness are
and though he has a cold
and can't taste anything
he goes on trying
until he bumps his head
against the yellow pistel

and gets no further than that
it's too hard
to push through the crown
into the root
so the bee takes off again
he emerges swaggering
loudly humming:
I was in there
and those
who don't take his word for it
can take a look at his nose
yellow with pollen

Zbigniew Herbert (1924–98) is one of the central figures of postwar European poetry; the author of nine volumes of poetry and three collections of essays, he also wrote for stage and radio. He received many important international literary prizes, inluding the Jerusalem Prize. His Collected Poems was published by Ecco Press in 2006.

Alissa Valles is a poet and translator from Russian and Polish. She has worked for the Institute of War Documentation in Amsterdam, where she grew up, and is now working toward a doctorate in the Committee on Social Thought at the University of Chicago.

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Words without Borders opens doors to international exchange through translation, publication, and promotion of the best international literature. Every month we publish select prose and poetry on our site. In addition we develop print anthologies, work with educators to bring literature in translation into classrooms, host events with foreign authors, and maintain an extensive archive of global writing.